Srilanka thrashes Nepal by 76 runs

Srilanka’s Batting thrashed Nepal by 76 runs to win the opening day match of SAARC U-25 Twenty20 Cricket Tournament being played at Maldives.

Sri Lanka opted to bat first after winning the toss on the Astro turf surface. Nepalese bowlers struggle to maintain their line and length since the start of inning. However, Paras Khadka took the first wicket after 46 run opening stand in just 3 overs. Bowlers toiled hard through out the inning as they were trashed over the park. Srilanka scored 100 runs in just 11th over and lost their second wicket. Bankhu made well made 50 for his side and was stumpped on the bowling of Paras again.

The opener Dhanishka crushed Nepali bowlers for fours and sixes to get his 50 ball Century. He was caught at long off. Then Angelo Parera came to the party and scored 4 sixes off Paras’s bowling. Srilanka managed to put a mammoth total of 240/4 in their 20 overs. Paras Khadka took 3 wickets for 57 runs.

Meanwhile Nepal ended up with just scoring 164 runs, losing nine wickets during the chase playing all the 20 overs. Pradeep Airee and Prithu Baskota scored 35 and 32 runs respectively, but that was not enough for the chase and Nepal lost the match by 77 runs.

Sri Lanka’s Dhaniskha won the man of the match title, scoring over a century for his team.

“Today I expected my bowlers to do a lot better than the scorecard has suggested but instead they batted well against such a big test playing nation. Hope we will perform well in the next match”, Pubudu Dassanayake, the Coach of Nepal told, after the match. It was his first assignment as the cricket coach.